


Oracle and Silent Hitboy: The Genesis

by BlixaLooksCarsick



Category: Megami Tensei, Persona 5, Shin Megami Tensei, persona - Fandom
Genre: Gen, Slice of Life, allusions, references
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-15
Updated: 2018-09-15
Packaged: 2019-07-12 12:09:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,695
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15994922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlixaLooksCarsick/pseuds/BlixaLooksCarsick
Summary: Sometimes, a hobby is more than just a hobby. Between the birth of passion and the attainment of glory lies a wide valley of inconvenience.





	Oracle and Silent Hitboy: The Genesis

**Author's Note:**

> I'm gonna be honest here. I didn't really know what to write for everyone's favourite walking meme, so I looked at the work of some authors like Amos Oz and decided the mundane is sometimes worth writing about. After all, I need something comparatively trivial to write about after The Prisoner.
> 
> I may write something more about these two (not necessarily a ship) in the future. I feel I can approach the absurd like this.

Silence has never been so long and overwhelming. 

In a previous lifetime, a year ago, she was a shut-in. Back then, her ears would break through the silence of her room by finding the harmony in her computers’ electric humming. It was nearly imperceptible to the common ear, but to her, it was a hypnotic mantra – the one thing that could keep the corrupted memories of her mother at bay. It was by the heroic aid of the Phantom Thieves – whom she joined in their crusade – and the unceasing care of her foster father Sojiro Sakura, that she broke free from her tomb. With the memories of her mother Wakaba redeemed, she was prepared to come out into the light, to experience what she had missed out on. 

And some of it involved waiting around in public places, for long and tedious periods of time.

For the past three months, Futaba’s favourite recreational activity has been an online shooting game called F.O.E.S. The impressive library of games neatly stacked in her room narrates a history of skills well-honed into high competence. Futaba managed to earn a reputation in the game’s community just one week after the game’s launch. Her rising dominance since has gushed out into social media, as game-related posts across all services often carried the harshtag #AllHailOracle, whether in praise or ironic dissing. 

The first in-game event had been the foray into the Infinity Desert, wherein Oracle was the first player to find and defeat the four Lords of the Gun. The first chapter of the quest for the Immortal Beaver was thus spearheaded by Oracle, to the surprise of few. Yet this felt like little challenge to her. No, what she truly wanted, what she needed, was to test her skills against those who could someday rival her, the true masters who chose to stride under the radar. A complete overhaul of the current PvP system would not do. She needed true competition. Then, whether by recompense of chance or fate, the announcement broke the community’s floodgates open.

A grand tournament to unearth the country’s best gun. The Grind. Two categories. Single Player and Duo. Futaba Sakura knew the path to take. She would not allow herself be hindered by lesser gunman: true domination could only be attained by one. And their name would be Oracle, she grinned maniacally at the thought. Just one week away, six days of which she poured herself into refining her art whenever she was not at school - shaving instants off her reaction time, studying, memorising and becoming one with each map, learning all the habits of low and high tier players, ejecting herself from the meta. 

Her discipline was sharper than any instrument known to human kind. She favoured organisation and sensible management over the ineffectual measures of other, more obsessive would-be competitors, such as compromising her sleeping pattern, or neglecting to eat. She minded every single detail in and outside of the tournament. At the top of her vitality, she was prepared for it all. Since this was the first event for such a wide-spread game, registration would take place through an actual sign up in the Gigolo Arcade in Akihabara. There would be no chance for any incident, such as servers shutting down from sheer volume. All she Futaba had to do was show up early.

Nothing could stop her. Nothing… but her being underage and thus needing an adult to sing her into the competition. 

“WHAT!?” She yelled, standing at the registering booth in the arcade. The echo of which remains in her head, as does the burning scorn she experienced towards the clerk. She could swear he smirked at her outrage. She just knows he is smirking right now. 

“Rules are rules, Miss.” The carbuncular employee deployed special emphasis on the word ‘Miss’. “Underage entries must be authorised by an adult. Be it parent or suitable relative.” She felt the mocking glances around her. If they only knew who this drone was speaking to. In hindsight, the ridicule might have tarnished the name, both lauded and dreaded, or Oracle. 

“Rrrrrrrrrggggggghhhhh!!!” She growled. “Okay! Hold here. I’m calling my dad. He can sign your stupid-ass registration thing.” 

“Miss.” He goes again. “You’ll need to step away. You’re holding the line.”

“Yeah! Get off!” Some guy called out loud. Several others mimicked him. A flush of anger rendered her face as red as the dye on her hair. 

“Assholes…” She muttered as she pulled her cell phone to call Sojiro. It took precious five minutes for her to explain what she needed, and twenty more for him to arrive, by which time, she found out that all entries for the Single Player wing of the competition had been filled. 

“Alright, Futaba. Where is this… uh, whatever?” The man grumbled, still unsure of what she needed. 

Futaba was silent, her head cast down to the floor, bright reddish orange hair cascading down.

“Futaba?”

She could bring herself to do nothing but point at the booth. What was the use? She thought to herself. Her chance was gone. Why did she not simply leave? Was she harbouring some sort of hope he could remedy the situation? Find her a place so she could demonstrate Oracle’s prowess with the gun? Though she would not regard the clerk with her eyes, he was taking pity on her by now. It mattered none. She simply gave Sojiro all the information required, and walked out of the store. As she did so, she failed to notice someone else entering the store. Had he not moved as he walked, she would surely have knocked herself to the ground.

Futaba leans against the wall of the arcade outside. The sun shines with a tint of melancholy. For the briefest moment, she perceives a certain beauty to the scenery, despite her dejected spirits. The quiet, docile setting does away with her sighs. Hallowed silence.

“You okay, Miss?” A highly boyish voice says at her side. She turns to look at him. A bespectacled boy with black hair and round face, almost exactly her height. He is the kind of boy she would probably babysit. Polite. Blissfully unaware of the harrowing edges of human experience. Smelly, she thinks, though she does not actually perceive any odour coming off of him. Uncomfortable silence.

Suddenly, Futaba wishes she were anywhere but here. 

“Miss…?” He repeated himself. His voice, though not any different from that of any other boy, was bothersome to Futaba. “Miss?”

“Ugh, what?” Futaba was just about to lose her patience.

“You don’t look okay. Are you okay?” 

The bitter look she gave him appeared to suffice for an answer, as he stopped talking. The minutes passed and there seemed to be no sign of Sojiro’s return. Before becoming a master of coffee and curry, the man worked in the government, therefore he was no stranger to the ins and outs of bureaucracy. Futaba could not guess why he was taking so long. Yet she still found the prospect of failure as dreadful as the present uncertainty, and in the middle of the latter, the presence of that boy gnawed away at what little calm she had left. She knew he was looking at her. 

“Why are you still here!?” She blurted out. “Don’t you have somewhere else to be a bother?” 

“I’m… waiting for my dad.” He pointed towards the arcade. “And, uh, watching the moped.”

“What.”

“The… moped.” He pointed towards the other side of the street where indeed there was a parked moped - the oldest, ugliest thing Futaba had ever seen on two wheels. For the briefest moment, she imagined her friend and ‘team mum’ Makoto Niijima riding that. It was a horrendous transition from her amazing Johanna, which only looked more pathetic when imagining ‘team dad’ Akira riding along. Futaba’s head was filled with all sorts of absurd, occasionally disturbing images upon finding they were actually a couple. Perhaps, she thought, she could improvise a sketch of Makoto riding that disgraceful excuse for a vehicle with Akira’s arms around her waist. If she could get Yusuke to create a painting from that, he would surely capture the bemusement to its fullest.

“Heh, heh, heh.” Futaba chuckled quietly with a depraved intonation. Her face became that of a bird of prey with a plentiful, bloody bounty in sight – the kind of expression that could turn the heads of pedestrians in bewilderment and dread. Naturally, the young boy caught sight of it. Considerably disturbed, he remained silent for a couple of seconds as the chuckle went on.

But for all the kinds of strange he saw radiating from Futaba, the awkward boy would not stay quiet for long. 

“I like your hair. It’s very long.” Something about the way he spoke hinted he was about to say something else. Was it merely an observation, a question of sorts? Futaba’s first instinct was to respond with sarcasm, but what kind of reply would she get from this odd boy? Bored by the wait, which felt like almost half an hour by now, she placed her bet.

“Thanks. I grew it myself.” 

“How did you do that?” Was he being serious, or was he pulling her leg, equally bored as she was?

“By eating a lot of curry.”

“How much curry?” 

“A lot and then some.” At every passing moment, her conviction grew that this kid was trying to pull some mind game. It dawned on her then that he probably was in the same situation as her. After all, why was he in Akihabara, waiting outside of the Gigolo Arcade of all places, if not for also being locked out of the competition because of a senseless technicality? He was surely trying to take her spot, if there was one to be had. She would not let it happen. The game was on. “My name is Futaba. Futaba Sakura.”

“I’m Kaoru Munehisa.” 

“Good. Excellent.” She said. She knew he had to throw him off somehow. Intimidate him or weird him out of the way. If she could not achieve that, she could at least try and gain some psychological advantage that could come in handy in the future. Alas, she stood in the shadow of a caveat: she could not identify herself as Oracle. Doing so would either make her lose face considering the situation or cheapen her reputation.

“Yeah. I’m proud of my name.” The first natural-sounding thing he said so far. Futaba interpreted this as a sign of value towards tradition and family. She may be able to exploit that through trash talk.

“I mean. It’s alright.” She said casually, probing further. 

“Could be worse. I know a girl named Inari.” 

“HA!” Futaba blurted out. Though she seemed to have failed to root out a weakness in Kaoru’s ego by downplaying his name, she found his remark too amusing to ignore. “I know an airhead who’s a total Inari.” Suddenly, a bout of panic. Did Kaoru know about her? Was there something to the ‘Inari’ remark? 

“Miss? You okay? You went pale just now.”

“Ah, no. I just thought of something gross.” She tried to save her cool.

“Something gross like soaked rice?”

“Ugh! Quit it with the Inari stuff!” Futaba laughed despite herself. “Rice soaked in what, though?”

“Uh… ketchup?” 

“Yeah, gross. I don’t wanna keep talking about this, Kaoru-kun.” She said with a haughty demeanour. “You don’t talk to girls much, do you?”

“Um, no.” His eyes burrowed into the front of his shoes. “A friend of my dad started teaching me, but he went away, I think.” 

“That sounds sad, Kaoru-kun. You’re sad, Kaoru-kun.”

“Hey! That’s…”

“I mean, you haven’t even asked me what my zodiac sign is, or what kind of syrup I like on my ice cream.” She pressed on. “Or even who my favourite Phoenix Ranger from Phoenix Ranger Featherman R is! Let alone who I ship between them!”

“Uh, okay. Which is your one true pairing?” Kaoru sounded unsure.

“It’s too late, Kaoru-kun! I ship Red Hawk and Black Condor, with occasional steamy incursions from Blue Swan, but this is just a pity response!” 

“What… are you…?” Kaoru was showing clear signs of confusion. Futaba’s plan appeared to be working.

“What! Have you prejudice against people who favour love triangles?” Futaba focused all of her intent into a glare, shooting straight at Kaoru’s eyes with an intensity that could shatter his glasses. “Are you judging me, Kaoru-kun?”

“No?”

“Good. That’s the number one thing to never do when talking to a girl.” She flashed a devious grin. Judging by his body language, Kaoru was wishing to hop on his ugly moped and ride off into the sunset, or at least away from this strange girl. Whether this meant clearing out a potential spot in the tournament or securing an advantageous place in a rival’s inner workings, it was a triumph. Of course, she was aware he mentioned waiting for his father, so the latter seemed more feasible. “Did your dad’s friend teach you that?”

“N-no, he…”

“Did he teach you to never talk to strangers?”

“Huh?”

“You know… you shouldn’t have started talking to me. You never know. I could be some psycho, maybe a creepy old lady, a master of the disguise masquerading as a cutie to get close to boys so I can boil their teeth.” She started to approach Kaoru, whose eyes opened wider at every second. “I could be a serial unlicensed dentist, or a weirdo who pokes butts with a needle…” She could see beads of sweat on his face.” I could be… yakuza.”

“Heh.” A deep, gravelly voice started behind her. Futaba went pale upon seeing him. Tall and muscular, wearing a long, grey coat. A tattoo on his neck which his black turtleneck did not entirely conceal, and a look about his eyes, piercing like a nail gun, which the shadow of his hat did not disguise, at all. Not even the lollipop in his mouth sweetened the aura around him. “A puny yakuza… that’ll be the day. It’s a go, Kaoru. Let’s go.”

Futaba wondered if anyone in the district did not hear her gulp. 

“Alright then. Drop by sometime in the week, yeah?” Sojiro walked out of the door behind him. “I’ll show you what real coffee is.” Boss spoke with a tone both challenging and amiable. “Can you believe this guy, Futaba? He thinks he knows altura.”

“Sojiro?” Futaba whimpered, startled.

“We’ll see about that.” Iwai Munehisa returned the gesture. “Nice to meet you, Sakura-san.”

“Same here, Iwai.” Sojiro paused. “You must be Kaoru-kun, eh?” He greeted Iwai’s son. “Hope you two got on well early.”

“Uh….” Kaoru and Futaba uttered simultaneously.

“The ‘single player’ spots, was it? Yeah, they were all taken, but there was still room in the team section.” Sojiro turned to look at his daughter. “You’re in the tournament, Futaba. Good thing this guy walked in to get his kid signed in too.” 

“What.” Futaba blurted out.

“You two are gonna be teammates for this thing. That’s good, right?” Iwai was clueless.

Kaoru stood there in complete silence. His expression betrayed nothing of what strange mixture of emotions and forebodings brewed in his mind.

“I’m sure you two will get it all sorted. Mune-san here, he’s bringing his son to the café while I show him he knows nothing about coffee.” Sojiro emphasised the latter words.

“There he goes again.” Iwai chuckled. “This guy, I swear.”

Futaba’s eyes shot directly into Kaoru’s. Within a few days, she would rationalise that this would be the only possible outcome for that day. In her hope and her hubris, she planned and acted on a mistaken premise. Though it was not what she intended, at least there was a chance for her to make her mark in the tournament. Whether Kaoru, in-game handle Hitboy, proved a suitable partner or a liability, only time shall tell. But at the end of that day, Futaba endured the full extent of her actions. It was a very palpable sensation at the bottom of her stomach. And it felt like rice soaked in ketchup.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading. One shots for Haru and Mona are coming, respectively. Also got a couple more ideas for Akira and Makoto, perhaps something spicy, and then... Akira's return to Tokyo for good.


End file.
